...with
the art of Toyah. Yes, the flame-haired minx is
back, making saucy records, playing Boadicea and
hoping no-one thinks she has a fat bum. Robin
Smith says perish the thought!

Toyah
wants to go on the warpath. She hopes to be
playing the part of Boadicea, the gal who led a
revolt against those naughty Romans about two
thousand years ago.

"Nothing
has been confirmed yet and I haven't signed
anything but it sounds like a very interesting
part," she says. "It will be a musical
film and some more stars will be taking part, but
I can't say who they are."

Ah
well, perhaps we'll see Sting in one of those
cute Roman tunics showing off his knobble knees,
or Jim Kerr as a Roman emperor...on second
thoughts, perhaps not.

"Boadicea
was a Queen who led a crusade against the
Romans," continues Toyah. "Her people
and the Romans had lived in peace until two
Romans raped her daughters.

"Boadicea
was the Margaret Thatcher of her day. She was a
very strong willed woman who could only see her
own way and what was straight in front of her.
She was very wilful and stubborn. For a time the
rebellion was successful, but eventually it was
crushed.

"Nobody
knows what happened to Boadicea. It's believed
that she was reincarnated but the end of her life
is quite a mystery. She didn't ride in a chariot
with spikes on the wheels, that was something the
Victorians made up to make her character more
romantic."

Toyah
says that the women she's admired in history have
been very strong willed.

"I've
always admired women with fire, aggression and
spirit. Women who were prepared to stand up for
what they believed in and really fight. I like
brave women like Joan Of Arc.

"I've
never liked soft and coy women like Nell Gwynne
who used soft charms to get around men, I don't
find them interesting."

Toyah's
been carving up the charts again with "Don't
Fall In Love" and an action-packed,
adventure-filled album is on its way, so hang on
to the edge of your seats.

"I've
spent about nine months getting out of my old
record deal. I think my singles are going to last
longer in the charts. I want a slow kind of build
up now. I don't want to dash up to the top of the
charts and then fall back swiftly."

She
seems to have changed a bit as well, opting for a
cooler, more subtle approach.

"I
don't dye my hair that much anymore. I did all
that five years ago, it's time for a change. But
when I hit the stage I'm still going to
bite."

Toyah
might not have been around for a little while in
the charts, but she's been keeping busy romping
around nude in 'The Ebony Tower' with Sir
Laurence Olivier (on the box not long ago) and
she's been writing a whole case full of new
songs.

"I'm
sure Fiesta or some other magazine is going to
get hold of some of those shots from 'The Ebony
Tower' and use them but there will be nothing I
can do. I hope people judged the scene within the
context of the programme. The director even
stripped off to make us feel more comfortable.

"I
hope people weren't looking at me just as voyeurs
thinking 'she's got a fat bum and short legs'.
I'm going to America soon and I'm sure I'm going
to receive a lot of publicity for appearing nude,
but I hope it's not over emphasised.

"I
think you can appear nude in something and still
be a feminist. I've got nothing against Samantha
Fox, except I think she's a bit young to be doing
what she does."

Toyah's
album will be aptly called 'Minx' and she says
it's going to be pretty darn racy stuff.

"I
wanted to call it 'Requiem' or something equally
as mysterious but one day I had a row with my
producer in the studio and he said 'you...you
minx!' We all thought that 'minx' would be a
great title for the album and the name
stuck.

"The
album is very commercial but parts of it are very
sexually explicit. It won't get banned though,
because of the way I've phrased the
material.

"There's
one track called 'Terrorist Of Love'. It's about
how we all worship the gun and how we are all
really hunters, but it's obvious that the gun
becomes a phallic symbol.

"Last
year I wrote 48 songs. I usually write songs
because I have to, but this time the ideas just
flowed and flowed."

Yes,
Toyah doesn't lounge around at home watching
television all night. One of the floors in her
house has been converted into a gym and she works
out every evening. She's even put mirrors on the
ceiling so she can watch herself sweat. After
that it's off to the library and study for a spot
of writing.

Toyah
says that the current single is based on old
memories, when she was a podgy little schoolgirl
desperate for a spot of romance.

"It's
about jealousy. You're watching a situation
between a boy and girl or a man and a woman and
don't want it to happen. I was always a
gooseberry, I was always getting left out of
things and getting jealous."

Apart
from her album, Toyah's been doing plenty of
other things. She's teamed up with Genesis
keyboard player Tony Banks to work on music for a
sci-fi epic involving lots of nasty robots and
there's been talk of her playing Tinkerbell in a
production of 'Peter Pan' starring Sting. Her
main priority has been songwriting though.

"I
love writing songs for men," she says.
"I think I'm able to write songs which bring
out female sexuality, which is something men have
great difficulty doing properly.

"I
want to write or create something which is really
important. I haven't fulfilled myself by a long
way yet. I really want to do something which will
go down in history as being something
great.

"I'm
not going to have children until I'm 40. If I had
children now they would interfere with my career.
I couldn't write and sing and look after a child
properly. It sounds ruthless but that's the way
it has to be."